Like most universities, Iowa State has a problem with sexual assaults. A majority of these assaults, if not all, have a white male assailant(s), with a female victim.

The NRA-funded debate of allowing guns on campus has somehow reared its ugly head once again. With trigger happy Faux News watching conservatives exclaiming at the top of their lungs, “guns will save lives and end assaults.” They quickly discount the lives of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and countless other non-white males. These lives were not saved by guns, rather ended by them.

The answer to lowering the number of sexual assaults isn’t bringing guns on campus, it’s education. We are at a university after all, not a war zone. A Colorado school has suggested that vomiting, yelling for help or telling the attacker you are menstruating will prevent an attack. These are very effective, proven non-violent techniques that Iowa State should adopt. Even if these non-violent techniques somehow still do not deter the assailant(s), why should shooting them with a gun be the next logical step? If someone commits a sexual assault, they go to jail, not the electric chair or firing squad. Most assaults do not last very long anyway. Sexual assault is not a death sentence, and we are not vigilantes.